January 28, 2003

Ashland City Council City Hall Ashland, OR 97520

Oregon Shakespeare Festival

www. osfashland.org

Re: Report for Resolution No. 2000-25, due January_ 31, 2003

Dear Council Members:

On behalf of the Festival Board, staff and audience, thank you for the City's $108,640 Economic and Cultural development grant for 2002-03.

I am pleased to report that the Festival's 2002 season saw the largest attendance in OSF history -- 399,609 tickets, or 88 percent of capacity. Additionally in 2002, the Festival increased its new accounts over the previous season by 19.3%; a total of 58,096 tickets in 2002 went to visitors new to OSF.

The 2003 season is looking equally promising with four world premieres that will draw unprecedented national and international press. OSF anticipates welcoming for the first time Time magazine, the London Times, the Guardian (London) and Die Welt (Germany). In addition, National Public Radio will create a special nationwide program on OSF.

Promoting Tourism in 2003

OSF will spend over $600,000 in marketing in FY2003. The following are among the actions already taken, or to be taken, toward the goals outlined by the Economic and Cultural Development Committee, specifically Goal 3(b), "To promote tourism."

TOURISM SALES

Season brochure. 550,000 copies of the full-color 2003 season brochure have been distributed nationally and internationally to OSF's mailing list of individual ticket buyers, members, schools and universities, businesses and corporations, government agencies, to media contacts, tourist and business locations throughout Oregon, and to trade shows in Japan, Germany, England and Switzerland.

Advertising. OSF has placed and will continue to place display ads in major newspapers in the Bay Area, Sacramento, Portland and Seattle. Public radio sponsorship ads will run on OPB and JPR, reaching the entire state of Oregon with information on OSF's upcoming world premieres. Together with the Ashland Chamber, OSF has supported co-op ads in Sunset magazine. Additionally, through its website, www.osfashland.org, OSF links to lodgings, restaurants and other Southern Oregon attractions.

HOSPITALITY AND SPECIAL EVENTS

Trade shows. OSF has partnered with the Ashland Chamber at trade shows from Los Angeles to Canada. OSF regularly participates in the Ashland Hospitality Showcase and contributes staff support to the Ashland Visitors and Convention Bureau.

Communication and training. OSF actively participates in, and regularly hosts, the Ashland Greeters to thoroughly inform community leaders about pertinent visitor information. Additionally, OSF hosts two brownbag lunches a year at which Artistic Director Libby Appel shares insights on the season's plays with members of the hospitality community. These talks are now videotaped and broadcast throughout the season by community access television stations from San Diego to Seattle.

MEDIA RELATIONS

New Theatre. OSF continues to maintain relationships and build new ones with reviewers and writers up and down the West Coast, particularly Oregon and California, where more than 80% of OSF patrons reside. The opening of the New Theatre in March 2002 resulted in strong West Coast media coverage of that event, including a spread in Sunset. OSF also hosted for the first time Don Shirley from the Los Angeles Times and Wendell Brock of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Other coverage in 2002 included articles and mentions in Travel & Leisure, Fodor's Guide, Rough Guide, New York Times, Alaska Airlines Magazine, Nuvo (Canada), Back Stage West and American Theatre.

New technology. Over the past year OSF has developed one of the most comprehensive electronic press kits used by any theatre in the country. The significant increase in national media coverage about OSF in 2002 was in large part due to the ease of access to high-resolution images through OSF's secure electronic press kit. The photo from Macbeth that appeared in the New York Times in early summer 2002 is one example. In addition, OSF has developed a comprehensive video pitch reel that is delivered to select national, and all west coast, television stations for both spring and summer openings. These pitch reels contain digital footage of OSF productions as well as extensive establishing shots of Ashland. This stock footage is used by television stations when doing both theatre and non-theatre stories on our region.

OSF in the Community

The past year also saw the continuation of OSF's active participation in our community, through Festival programs and in community work by company members. We are especially proud of the success of the third year of the new Ashland Schools Project, in which the OSF Education Department, and specifically a team of two OSF actor-teachers, works with 3rd- through 9th- graders in the Ashland School District. During the past year, 213 freshmen participated at the high school, 729 students at the middle school, and 540 students at the elementary schools.

The program began in Fall 2002 with all AHS freshmen English students attending Julius Caesar. Before seeing the show, the students had a preparatory session with an OSF actor- teacher. Afterwards, a Julius Caesar cast member visited each class for a follow-up discussion.

At the middle school, the actor-teachers performed a 30-minute version of Julius Caesar for all 6th-sth graders. Half the 7th- and 8th-graders then took a backstage tour, while the other half visited with OSF artisans. This year, the two groups will rotate.

At the elementary schools, the actor-teachers performed their Julius Caesar for 3rd- through 5th graders, then visited each 5th-grade class with a trunk full of costume renderings, fabric swatches, set designs and photos of past productions to use in discussing Julius Caesar with the students.

Volunteer participation by Ashland residents also reflects OSF's connection to the community. In 2002, 666 local residents were active volunteers at OSF, contributing in excess of 30,000 hours of service.

OSF's Diversity Efforts

In recent years one of OSF's key initiatives has been creating greater diversity in our staff and audience. We have seen dramatic success in some areas. Today, more than 25% of the acting company are people of color and the Festival offers more employment to actors of color than any other theatre in America. In other areas the pace of change is much slower. About 6% of our production and administrative staff are minorities, and we continue to work to raise that proportion. In addition, the Festival now employs an audience development manager whose focus is developing programs to increase the number of people of color in our audience.

For the last five years, the Festival has undertaken diversity training for its staff. In 2002, we took a leadership position within the City to encourage other institutions to join us in addressing the issue of diversity. After an initial planning session, two diversity workshops were held with representatives from the Ashland Police and Fire departments, Southern Oregon University, Ashland Community Hospital, the City Council and staff, religious organizations, the Chamber of Commerce and Community Works. The next workshop is scheduled for March 6. We are hopeful these efforts will lead to a greater citywide awareness and appreciation of the benefits of diversity.

Economic Impact

The Festival's economic impact on Ashland and Southern Oregon exceeded $129 million* in 2002. Beyond this economic impact, the City received $1,168,000 from the Hotel/Motel tax in 2001/2002 and $1,268,000 from the Food and Beverage tax. OSF's activities are a major factor in the generation of these taxes.

* 88,496 OSF visitors multiplied by average 3-night stay multiplied by $96.29 average daily expenditures (excluding theatre tickets) = $25,564,048. $25,564,048 plus OSF expenditures of $19,030,187 multiplied by Oregon multiplier of 2.9 = $129,323,300.

Conclusion

Over the past twenty-two years, the Ashland City Council's commitment to investing in the promotion of tourism through the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the Ashland Chamber of Commerce has paid off handsomely. Through that investment, the City has helped build a powerful economic and cultural engine that has created a stable base of funding for many City activities. At a time when other theatres and other cities are facing severe deficits and cutbacks, we are seeing continued interest in Ashland and the Festival, in large part because of concerted cooperation between the two. This is clearly a time when the support of the Council is crucial to the ongoing health of both the Festival and the City - two entities that have been linked for almost seventy years.

Again, thank you very much for your support. We are grateful to be the recipient of an Economic and Cultural Development grant this year and look forward to your continued funding.

Sincerely, Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Paul E. Nicholson · Executive Director